Cancer Survivor Now Fights For Awareness

It tells the story of strength of character, of the struggle to survive against the odds and live life every day to the fullest. It also tells the story of life slowly taken, stolen by the savage disease known as breast cancer.

Gatewood mostly chooses to focus on the positives of the pink breast-cancer-awareness ribbon and speaks with cautious joy about the three years of remission she has counted since her diagnosis and treatment for the disease that strikes so many women each year. She focuses on the future.

"I'm 49 and I am happy to celebrate all my birthdays because I am alive," Gatewood said. "Now I use my experiences, my knowledge to help educate others so that one day, no one will suffer or die from breast cancer."

While the rest of the state has had its eyes on the controversial Confederate heritage license plate in recent months, Gatewood and fellow members of the Virginia Breast Cancer Foundation have been lobbying for a different cause, the cause behind a simple pink ribbon.

It took two years to collect the signatures and money necessary to get a petition put before the General Assembly and the Department of Motor Vehicles, but late last month the last of 380 applicants paid their $25 reserve fee and signed their names on the dotted line.

Production is under way on the state's first commemorative license plate honoring breast-cancer awareness. The plate will sport a pink ribbon and the motto "Educate, Advocate, Eradicate."

Gatewood and fellow members of the breast cancer foundation initiated the movement, which won the support of Del. Kirkland Cox, R-Colonial Heights. His legislation authorizing the plate was passed easily.

Gatewood, a real estate agent, was diagnosed with breast cancer in May of 1996 and soon began treatment for the often deadly disease. She suffered through bouts of illness, the hair loss that accompanies chemotherapy and the fear that the pain was for nothing, that the cancer would win.

But in 1997 Gatewood walked away a survivor and an advocate for breast cancer awareness, a cause that fuels the Tri-City resident in everything she does.